


Muruval

by sanchari (s_h_y)



Category: Ramayana - Valmiki
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, lakshmana is there, mostly as comic relief, sorry bro ur still my number one man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-30
Updated: 2020-09-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:54:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26736190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/s_h_y/pseuds/sanchari
Summary: “His hair was dark, like a deep blue sapphireHis face radiant as the full moon,His arms long and lean,His shoulders, dark and strong,like massive gems, but -it was his smile that captured my soul.”- Kamban, Ramavataram.
Relationships: Rama/Sita (Ramayana)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Muruval

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys remember that time i remembered a quote i read months ago and immediately astral projected so hard i wrote this lil ficlet in one sitting
> 
> Like Kalidasa, I too am not always really convinced by the idea of the Ramayana being Rama's and Sita's great love story, and if I'm being absolutely honest I'm not even always really convinced that Rama loved Sita truly, or that they were really in love with each other. Maybe it's just that the events of Uttara Kanda left me kind of angry and bitter. But this quote has my heart, and I decided to bury my cynicism tonight. Like Kamban's Sita, I too have a soft spot for smiles.

“His hair was dark, like a deep blue sapphire  
His face radiant as the full moon,  
His arms long and lean,  
His shoulders, dark and strong,   
like massive gems, but -   
it was his smile that captured my soul.” 

\- Kamban, _Ramavataram._

* * *

"Why don't you come here and try it, coward?"

Sita hears Urmi laugh softly behind her as Prince Rama touches his brother’s shoulder. "Lakshmana," he hisses, but the second - that is, Lakshmana - subsides only the barest amount. Rama shoots an apologetic look at her, and her father, and Sita has trouble hiding her smile.

He notices. The Prince smiles back, then gives in and laughs, embarrassed. It makes him suddenly, strikingly beautiful; Sita pauses.

"He's - ah, he's not always like that," says the Prince, somewhat awkwardly.

"More's the pity," says Urmi under her breath. Sita snorts and nudges her pointedly. Urmi takes the hint and goes, but not without shooting Sita a look over her shoulder that has the poor Prince blushing furiously.

Sita clears her throat. "She - she meant no -"

"No, no, of course," says the Prince quickly.

Neither of them says anything for a few seconds. Sita is not used to this (all of her sisters are chattier than she is).

Somewhere across the room Lakshmana's roars something about how he'll take off some king's head and mount it on a spike for his palace gates for speaking of them that way.

Sita bites her tongue to keep sober. Rama winces. "I - I'm not... going to let that happen," he tells her father quickly, half-mouthing, half-gesturing. Janaka gives him a grateful look.

"The king of Sindhu isn't known for his skills has a warrior," says Sita by way of assurance. "I'm sure your brother will be fine."

The Prince blinks. "What? Oh, no, I'm not - _he'll_ be fine. He's always fine. I'm just - you know, he'll go and kill this guy for saying that, and then his son or brother or someone will declare war on us, you know, and then my father and brothers, we'll all have to defend ourselves, and the army and...all of that, for what? Because he's angry right now? It's just so - _Lakshmana!_ Stop that, come back here, you -"

He breaks off suddenly, as the king Lakshmana had been facing swings his sword right at his throat in the second that Lakshmana turned around. Sita draws in a sharp breath, but Lakshmana has blocked the blow already.

Rama sighs and gives her a small, tired smile. "See? Nothing ever happens to him. It's a combination of skill and luck." He pauses. "And me. I…I do a lot."

Sita wonders what it's going to take to get this man to talk about himself. “And you?”

“I...” He shrugs self-consciously and brushes a lock of hair away from his face. “I...I get by.”

Sita tries not to sigh. So he’s charming and powerful but not a conversationalist. Maybe that would have been too much to ask for. 

He has a beautiful smile, though. A soft, warm one, almost shy, crinkling his eyes into crescents, transforming his whole face. It lifts her spirits just to look at it, even now, when he stands there like a tree, letting her stare at him but not quite meeting her eye.

She wants him, she realizes. She’s glad he won.

* * *

In the beginning, exile only sees Rama become more withdrawn. Not even quiet so much as...silent. Lakshmana’s pain and rage comes out first in to the form of aggressive woodcutting, then in training, doing drills over and over as though he’s going to war, and it’s painful to see, but whatever Rama is feeling does not come out at all, and that’s worse. He’s like a house left empty, all the lights blown out. 

Sita doesn’t know what to do. 

“Some say death is a gift,” she says gently one night. They’re sitting alone outside their little hut, and the forest is almost silent itself, save for the chirping of stubborn crickets. “A release. From all of the mortal plane’s trappings.”

Rama makes a wan, half-hearted attempt at a smile. “Then I’m happy for him. But I - the thought of living on without him - that he died alone -” he breaks off, and shakes his head slowly. “I suppose that’s one of the mortal trappings.” 

Sita winces. “I didn’t mean - “

“I know.” There’s a pause, and then he rises to his feet. “Thank you, Sita.” His voice is distant, almost formal. She can’t see his face, but she can guess what it looks like. 

He holds one hand out to her. “It’s getting late. We should go in.” 

The pallor does not lift from his face until a week later, the day a deer gives birth in the woods close by and they catch sight of the fawn. The look of wonder on his face, the way he steps closer slowly slowly, so as not to frighten the thing, the way his hands are trembling a little as he reaches out instinctively and stops himself a moment later - 

The way his face breaks into a baffled, wondering smile, real _joy_ , the first real smile she has seen on him in weeks.

This is the moment that Sita realizes that one day she wants children with this man. 

* * *

The loneliness has been the worst part. 

In the Ashokavana (the irony of the name has not escaped her), there are the women who guard her - who berate and ignore her - who exhaust her. There are trees and birds and squirrels, and once, memorably, an incorrigible _vanara_. 

There is nobody to talk to. No Rama to debate philosophy with her. No Lakshmana to argue with about what kind of bird this is, whether the sweetest berries are really the smallest ones. It eats away at her, this isolation, this relentless bellyaching and belittling and barking. The silences are few and far between and _empty,_ and some days she wishes she could at least hear those two talking to each other, even if nothing was said to her, even if the conversation was trivial and inane.

Once, in the early days of exile, she spent a good half hour eavesdropping, trying to desperately to stifle her laughter, as Rama and Lakshmana tried to figure out how to build a strong enough trellis against the house for vines to grow - the ones they built kept breaking under the weight, or worse, collapsing on the spot. It was how seriously they were both taking it, or it was their ridiculous methods of testing it, or maybe it was just how they kept mixing up the lengths of wood that they had cut themselves - she can’t remember. 

She keeps going back to the moment when she could bear it no longer and collapsed into giggles, the moment Rama turned, startled, and then laughed too at the sight of her. Embarrassed. Affectionate. Rama smiled at her every time she entered the room. 

That was so long ago. Sita blinks tears out of her eyes, jaw clenched. She’ll die before she cries around any of these sycophants, but the war has been going on for so long. She is losing count of the days. To think they are so close - Rama is so close - and still beyond her reach. Sometimes it feels like more than she can bear. Even now. Even now that the worst is over. Even now that she’s so close to freedom.

The loneliness has been the worst part. Listening to the chaos outside, the shouting, the running, the news of buildings overturned and the palace overrun, of the army everywhere, _Rama's army, Rama_ \- Sita stands frozen, rooted, heart pounding. She can’t believe it. She can’t believe. 

When footsteps stop outside the gate, she forgets for a second that Ravana has died. But the steps are followed by – nothing, no shouting, no insults. ‘

When the gate opens, she – she tries to remind herself, her damp palms, her pounding heart, that the worst is _over._ It won’t be Ravana. It won’t be – the loneliness was the worst part, but god, god, Ravana was the closest second.

When he walks through the gate - alone, thank god - it takes her a few moments to fully register it. That it has happened, that it _is happening_

He walks in, and maybe it’s something about the way she’s standing there like a statue, but he stops a few steps away, looking suddenly uncertain. 

It’s that look that does. That stupid face, the same one he made at her swayamvara as they both realized he had won. Sita bursts into laughter, into tears, into a shaking mess. In seconds they’ve closed the gap. He’s here. He’s here. She looks up into his face.

She’ll never forget it. The way his face glowed with that smile for a heartbeat, two, before faltering again. 

Something is wrong.

“Sita,” he says. “I have to ask you for something. To do something.”

* * *

This morning Rama left their room without looking her in the eye. Last night he came back late, after a day of - of avoiding her - and went to bed turned away, not speaking two words. Something has happened, but for the first time, she has no idea what it could be. 

Something is coming. She read its signs in the lines on Rama’s forehead, the creases around his eyes. She can’t remember the last time he smiled for real at all, much less at her. Something is coming, again. She feels unsteady, blind, waiting for it to arrive, wondering which door it will walk through. 

She is constantly on guard and still she doesn’t recognize it. The day Lakshmana comes and tells her Rama can’t come with her, that he’ll drive her instead, she doesn’t think about it twice. Not even at the look on his face. Not even at the tremor in his face. When has Rama been upset about anything in the past and his brothers unaffected?

(Later she will connect the dots. Retrospectively. Too late. But then, it was too late the moment Rama heard this rumour about her, wasn’t it?)

“I hope he sorts it out soon, whatever it is,” she says vaguely, climbing into the chariot. Lakshmana does not answer, but as the wheels roll, she looks up at the palace - 

and sees him. Just for a second, a split second but the look on his face stays branded in her memory as long she lives. An open, uncontrolled grief, a look in his eyes she hasn’t seen since his father died. 

“Lakshmana,” she begins, meaning to tell him to stop, and then thinks better of it. After all, he hasn’t been able to speak so much as a word to her for the last couple of days. He needs space to himself. Time alone. It’s Rama, after all.

* * *

It does something to her, the distance. The time, the space. Years ago, in the Ashokavana, she did nothing but yearn for him. Of course she did. She had been torn away from the only family she had left, she had been molested and belittled and trapped and hopelessly, desperately in love. 

Now...now things are different. She is not the same person any longer. Older, wiser. She has seen more, now. Not only of the world but also of _him,_ of Rama himself. The person he is...has been? Has become? 

Now things are different. Then she was trapped, enclosed, but here...here she is absolutely, unreservedly free. For the first time in her life, when Sita does anything she thinks only of herself. Only of what will make her happy, here, now, in this moment. She answers to no one. She is obliged to no one. She is utterly unbound, like the wind, like the rain. 

Now things are different. Once, in separation she had been surrounded by bitterness, vitriol, abuse. Here Valmiki reads out his work to her, and listens, thoughtful, head inclined, when she offers suggestions. Here the people of the ashram teach her to cook new dishes, to play new games, to spin and weave and dye and sew. They listen to her stories. There are days when she begins to speak and is unable to stop, words spilling out like a torrent, her body a burst dam, and still, they listen. 

Now things are different. Then, she had been alone; now, she has a family. The sage, his wife, his students. And soon, her sons. 

It does something to her, the distance, in time, in space. She hears about him still, the husband who is no longer hers. She hears about the things he does. The decisions he makes. She hears about him, but she finds herself listening differently, at last. There is no longer that rush of pained guilt, that struggle to rationalize. She is older now, wiser, she has seen more of the world and him and herself. She understands now. That he is not who everyone has convinced themselves he is - who could be? She understands that he is flawed, that he is struggling, that he, like so many, is lost at sea.

That he might not even really be the man _she_ made him out to be. That he - that he is not necessarily – that he is not a good man, not a righteous man, not a particularly kind man. 

What a strange, pitiful thing, love is. It had not occurred to her, when she was younger, that she could love someone who was not, in her eyes, a _good_ person. And yet here she is. After all that has happened, she still – she still misses him. Still cannot forget him. The sound of his soft, careful voice. The curve of his smile.

She feels a brief twinge of sorrow at this realization, both of how she was and how she is now when it comes to Rama. And yet there is no helping it. Kindness towards only those who one loves, or has an obligation towards, or who are compliant – it is not kindness at all.

She says this to her sons; they listen half-attentively, not quite looking away from the game they are engaged in.

“Yes, Ma,” says Kusha after a moment, in an attempt at sincerity; his brother chooses that moment to kill his pawn, and the moment passes, the spell over Sita broken by Kusha’s angry voice. She has moved so far forward. She has no reason to look back, she reminds herself. Nothing to look back at.

The twins have grown up hot-tempered, sharp-tongued, impulsive, stubborn. She is reminded, often and fondly, of their uncle, and is glad for it, even if it draws them into trouble sometimes. They’ll live eventful lives, she often jokes with the others at the ashram. There won’t be a slow moment for her boys. That they captured the horse is hardly a surprise - Lava has wanted to go horse-riding for months now; Kusha cannot keep his hands off any animal, not even the cubs of foxes or wolves, let alone a pet horse. (she is reminded, often and painfully, of their father, and is afraid for it). That they captured it was to be expected really, once it came this way. 

That they fought the princes, and won, is hardly a surprise either. They are prodigies, her sons, brilliant beyond their years, skilled beyond their childish bodies. She should not be surprised. 

But.

But this is too much. It’s - it’s beyond anything she had imagined, this possibility - this reality, of seeing him once more. She stands uncertainly in the doorway of the hut, watching as the figure comes closer and closer. She recognizes the gait first, then the color of his skin, then his limbs, his shoulders, his dark hair - 

It’s him. It’s - after all these years, he has come back to her once more.

She does not have the word to name this feeling. 

Rama raises his head then, looks up at her. Catches her gaze. She watches the recognition fill his face. He is still beautiful. After all that has happened - that he has done - he's still - 

“Sita.” He blinks, lips parting slightly in his surprise. And then - 

For a moment, for just a moment before rest of the world catches up to them - in the space between two heartbeats before he remembers his crown - Rama’s face breaks into his smile. 

**Author's Note:**

> I do not know Tamil, and I did not translate the Kamban quote!! However, there's this Instagram account I follow, @voicesofbhakti, who post lines of bhakti poetry. If you use Instagram I would highly recommend following them  
> The post with this quote is here: https://www.instagram.com/p/B0kMOmxAdb_/
> 
> this fic is also going on my tumblr, https://situational-ethics.tumblr.com/, but i posted it here for anyone who doesn't use tumblr much because i'm kind of proud of it.


End file.
